The caring gesture that no one saw: How Duchess Catherine consoled Duchess Meghan at Wimbledon

The sisters-in-law are closer than people realise.

Jul 18, 2019 10:06am

While the rest of the world has been talking and talking and talking about them, Duchesses Meghan and Catherine have been quietly getting on with becoming good friends.

This week they attended the tennis at Wimbleton together, and while that, in itself, was widely reported because it was their first joint appearance without their husbands since they attended Wimbledon a year ago, everybody missed the caring gesture that Duchess Catherine showed her new sister-in-law.

As the two royal women watched Serena Williams, a close friend of Meghan's, lose the women's final, Kate "put her hand out and rubbed Meghan's back to console her", an eyewitness told People.

"It illustrated a warm relationship between these women who have young babies and are in similar situations in their lives," says royal commentator Victoria Arbiter, whose father Dickie Arbiter was a press spokesman for Queen Elizabeth.

Royal insiders theorise that Prince Harry and Duchess Meghan's move to Frogmore Cottage in April and the splitting of the royal households has helped the sisters-in-law relationship by putting a little distance between them - allowing them to be less like "colleagues" and more able to enjoy one another as family.

With both women now parents, they also have more in common too.

Meghan brought Archie along to the polo last week. Image: Getty

Rumours swirled that Catherine and Meghan did not get on after reports surfaced that Meghan made Catherine cry during a dress fitting for Princess Charlotte, who was a flower girl for Harry and Meghan's wedding.